New York City Mayor Eric Adams was indicted on five federal charges of bribery, fraud and soliciting illegal foreign campaign donations. Prosecutors said the violations began when he was a top elected official in Brooklyn and continued after he became mayor.
The indictment, unsealed on Thursday morning, culminates an investigation that started in 2021 and has focused in part on whether he conspired with the Turkish government to receive illegal foreign campaign contributions and whether he took official actions on its behalf, the New York Times reports.
Adams responded that he has been demonized and urged New Yorkers to be patient: “I ask New Yorkers to wait to hear our defense.”
Prosecutors said that Adams “sought and accepted improper valuable benefits” since at least 2014, when he was then the Brooklyn borough president.
The benefits included luxury international travel — free and discounted Turkish Airlines tickets to Turkey and free meals and hotel rooms while there — from wealthy foreigners and at least one Turkish government official. He traveled on the airline even when it was inconvenient, including a 2017 flight to France from New York that first stopped in Istanbul.
Adams tried to hide the gifts or make them appear as if he had paid for them, according to the indictment, and deleted messages to cover his actions. The value of the gifts exceeded $100,000, prosecutors said.
In exchange for the perks, Adams as mayor pressured officials at the New York Fire Department to open a new Turkish consular building in Manhattan despite fire inspection issues. A Fire Department official assessment said he was told he would lose his job if he did not follow the mayor’s order.
“As Adam’s prominence and power grew, his foreign-national benefactors sought to cash in on their corrupt relationships with him, particularly when, in 2021, it became clear that Adams would become New York City’s mayor,” prosecutors said. “Adams agreed, providing favorable treatment in exchange for the illicit benefits he received.”
On Thursday morning, federal agents searched Adams' official residence, Gracie Mansion At 6 a.m., a dozen men and women arrived in S.U.V.s outside the entrance. A lawyer for Adams, Alex Spiro, said agents had come for the mayor’s phone, even though investigators had taken some electronic devices from him last year. Spiro said, "They send a dozen agents to pick up a phone when we would have happily turned it in.”
Several elected officials called for Adams to resign, including several Democrats running against him in next year’s Democratic primary. Gov. Kathy Hochul has the power to remove him from office.
Adams, a retired police captain, was elected New York’s 110th mayor in 2021 after a campaign built on a pledge to reduce crime and bring professionalism to City Hall.